Clairborne 6-25-2011

[Pinch]

Met up with Surfdog, Moc, and grady this morning at Wawa (0430) and convoyed down to Clairborn. It was a bit windy and there were a few white caps as Moc and Me headed out towards deeper water shooting for the 22-30ft out by the clam bouy. Grady and Surf stayed closer to the launch were it wasnt as rough. As soon as we setup i hear over my shoulder "fish on" from Moc. We started catching Croaker in the 11-15'' range, spot 5-10'' and white perch 5-12.5'' yes Moc missed a citation by a 1/2''. The morning was quite fishy until around 1000-1030 during the slack. Moc and I headed back to the landing to meet up with Tufnik. After a short stretch we headed back out and the fishing was...slow. However, when you did get a fish on the explosiveness of the hit would "make your heart skip a beat" as tufnik said over the VHF. BTW sidenote, Moc, Tufnik and I all had VHF's out today and it really helped the communication aspect. Towards the end of the day around 400pm the bite came back and it was a blast. As i made my way back to the launch i talked Tufnik onto a spot i had just found that was non stop bite. Hopefully he got on it the last thing i heard him say was "oh...I got something.." Heres some pictures of the fish i brought home, the biggest is at 15 3/4''.




More pictures from me shortly and im sure the other guys will have a bunch too. Great day.

[tufnik]

After going through the Bridge traffic, I arrived just after 1000 am. Met Grady and surfdog (for the first time; Good to finally meet you guys!) in the parking lot as they were loading up to leave. I hit the water about 1115 am. It was a very nice day. Some clouds. Light breeze. 80's. The water was calm most of the afternoon.

Marked hundreds of fish, but caught and took home a dozen (12-15"). Used shrimp and 7-month old salted squid.

Pinch, the big croaker was just a tad over 15". After you and moc left, I stayed on the water until 5:30 pm. Shoot, I didn't catch the citation croaker, but I did catch one croaker in your spot. After that, lots of marked fish, but the bites weren't there anymore. Anyway, it was fun fishing with you guys.

You're right, the radios worked well. After a while of no-bites, I would radio a couple of catches and they would come to the "hot area." Then Pinch would radio in his hot spot. Also, during the afternoon, I radioed them about a passing boatload of girls in bikinis.

Pics
- That's Pinch on the left and moc on the right in the background
- Croakers in a Wal-Mart nylon laundry bag; worked pretty well and kept them alive a while

[jffoley]

Nice job, guys. Looks like a great day out there. That's a good idea on the VHF. What channel did you mostly use?

[frettr00]

Very nice!

[moc]

It was a nice day. It was a little windy in the morning which caused allot of chop in the morning, but it was nothing that the Revo could not handle. It cut through and rode the swells like a champ. As I was heading out to the deeper water, I saw Pinch following me out as I looked behind me. By the time that we got out to the deeper water the water had calmed down and it was nice. Surf said that it was rough by him near the shore. I started to think about it and I think because Pinch and I headed to the opposite shoreline to deep water and the winds where coming from the north and West, that the western shore of Kent Island gave us some protection from the wind. Since Grady and Surf stayed near the eastern shore of Claiborne, they go the full effect of the wind which made the water alittle rougher for them. On this trip I got to use my new Navionic Chart Chip for my Fish Finder and also my new 12volt 12 ah battery for the Humminbird. The new battery allowed me to run my Color/GPS?FF all day. The charts were a great help in locating drop offs, steep slopes, etc.... When I found those locations, Pinch and I would fish it and land fish after fish between the two of us. When I had a fish on, a Head heading south saw me and turn around and dropped anchor....LOL. Pinch and I thought that was funny. Of course he soon moved out since he was not catching any fish. I also had a center console boat speed right up to me with all guns blazing. I was a little nervous at fist since I thought he wanted to run me over, but then he slowed down and pulled up next to me. He was friendly and said "Man I Gotta Buy one of those!", referring to my Revo. I then proceeded to tell him about my boat and Snaggedline. So it looks like we got another convert to come over to the "Kayak Side". I do not know how many miles I peddled, but boy am I tired. After fishing, Pinch and I went to a local Chilli's and got somthing to eat. I must have taken home a dozen fish...mostly 13.5 inch to nearly 16 inch croaker and a couple of large perch. I also caught jumbo spots, but I released them all. It was great fishing with everyone. No one smelled the skunk today.

[Grady-Black]

Nice to finaly meet you Pinch and Tufnik. Good to put faces to the names. Thanks for the pics also Guys and Moc. Last but not least thanks for the hookup Surfdog, I had fun. see you next week.
GB

[ictalurus]

Sounds like an excellent day. The radios are nice for spreading out and finding fish.

Hey Pinch--how did the Torque's batteries do?

[moc]

Sounds like an excellent day. The radios are nice for spreading out and finding fish.

Hey Pinch--how did the Torque's batteries do?

I was out with Pinch all day and he brought two batteries which allowed him to fish all day from 6:15am until at least 4pm.

[Grilled]

nice report and pics guys!!! 2 weeks ago i missed a citation croaker by 1/2 inch too! pretty pissed off about that

[ILV2F5H]

Looks like a blast! How the heck are us newbs supposed to keep up without a rutter/pedals.

[fjarhead]

where???

where is clairborne. It looks like you guys had a great time. what were you using for bait. I used to catch croakers on fishbites.

[moc]

Clairborne is on the Eastern Shore not far past St. Micheals Maryland. I was using bloodworms and fresh shrimp. The shrimp was the best bait. It caught most of the croakers. The bloodworms caught mostly spot and perch. Tufnik was having good luck catching croakers with salted squid.

[tufnik]

It was 7-month old salted squid. And shrimp too. When given the choice on a double hook rig, the croakers seemed to equally hit either baits.

[surfdog]

ha get a revo! JK im an old guy not hard to keep up with me and gradys even older man i lost a huge croaker fumbling around with the stringer all tangled with my rod leash got the end in his gills then realized it was tangled he flopped out of my hand and pulled the stringer out and got away pissed im surprised that moc and pinch didnt hear me cursing got that on in 8.5' of H2O by the green channel marker

where to next sat.? sunday evening launch on the severn for some night HHs